While overall trajectories of late-life depressive symptoms were comparable by race, there was racial variation in depression risk estimates associated with less-studied factors, such as US region of birth, a recent study found. Researchers utilized the Nurses’ Health Study prospective cohort, consisting of 29,483 non-Hispanic white and 188 black women, aged ≥60 years, who were free of depression. Data on race and risk factors were obtained from biennial questionnaires. They found:

• Black participants had lower risk of incident late-life depression compared to whites.

• Although blacks had higher prevalence than whites of some risk factors at study baselines, distributions of major contributors to late-life depression risk (low exercise, sleep difficulty, physical/functional limitation, pain) were comparable.

• There was evidence of effect modification by race for relations of region of birth (Southern birthplace), smoking, and medical comorbidity to depression risk.

• 4 trajectories were identified: minimal symptoms-stable (58.3%); mild symptoms-worsening (31.4%); sub-threshold symptoms-worsening (4.8%); and sub-threshold symptoms-improving (5.5%). Probabilities of trajectory types were similar for blacks and whites.

Citation: Chang S-C, Wang W, Pan A, Jones, RN, Kawachi I, Okereke OI. Racial variation in depression risk factors and symptom trajectories among older women. [Published online ahead of print August 5, 2016]. Am J Geriatr Psychiatr. doi:10.1016/j.jagp.2016.07.008.